Anger as thieves strip church pathway

Whitechapel Church have had flagstones stolen from their grounds. Philip Hardill / Rev Brunel James / Tom Pinder. (D521G433)

Published:06:00Saturday 23 August 2014

A congregation is up-in-arms after thieves made-off with flagstones from a graveyard in Cleckheaton.

Twenty-six slabs, thought to be worth around £5,000, were stolen from the bottom half of Whitechapel Church’s pathway at around midnight on Wednesday, August 13.

Police were called by a woman who lives across the road from the church after she spotted a small, red van in the area.

The blow came just after the church held a memorial service for their long-serving late choir singer Ewart Rymer.

Rev Brunel James, 43, said: “People who are enterprising enough to turn up in the dark in a van and lift and steal flagstones can make a legitimate living. It’s out of all proportion, what they are gaining to what we are losing.”

Churchwarden Tom Pinder, 76, thinks the crime was carried out by professionals because the stones weighed around two tonnes.